


Enough Love

by rainingover



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Doctors & Physicians, Established Relationship, First Meetings, Hospitals, M/M, Minor Injuries, Monsta X Bingo, Non-Linear Narrative, Secret Relationship, Serious Injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-08
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-22 13:23:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9609278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainingover/pseuds/rainingover
Summary: “What even happened tonight?” He asks, as Wonho slips past him and into the hallway of the apartment.“You don’t need to know,” Wonho replies, wincing as he shrugs off his faded leather motorcycle jacket. Kihyun doesn’t actually know if Wonho owns a motorcycle, but he also doesn’t know his real name, so that isn’t really a surprise.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Monsta X Bingo Winter edition! (Hospitals square)

 

**November Eighth**

 

Kihyun’s stomach performs its signature flip when he hears the buzzer: a curious mixture of excitement, longing, and sheer terror that appears every time now.  

When he opens the door, Kihyun is greeted by a split lip on a familiar face. It’s a welcome sight tonight, a split lip a small and insignificant inconvenience in the grand scheme of their lives. He’s been met by much worse than a split lip before. It’s been three weeks since Kihyun has last had to pull out his crudely put together first-aid kit - a kit made of things stashed away on the quiet, slipped into the pocket of his coat during rounds and put away for when he’ll inevitably need to use them - and play doctor and patient in his cramped bathroom.

Not that it’s playing doctor really, since he _is_ one.

“What even happened tonight?” He asks, as Wonho slips past him and into the hallway.

“You don’t need to know,” Wonho replies, wincing as he shrugs off his faded leather motorcycle jacket. Kihyun doesn’t actually know if Wonho owns a motorcycle, but he also doesn’t know his real name, so that isn’t really a surprise.

“But I want to.” Kihyun sticks out his chin defiantly, kicks the door shut behind him with his heel and takes Wonho’s jacket from him. “You know that.”

Wonho is shaking his head softly. He doesn’t look at Kihyun as he hands over his jacket. “It’s not something you want to get involved in…”

“I don’t want to get _involved_ , I just want to understand.” Kihyun sighs, grips Wonho’s elbow and leads him to the bathroom.

“Maybe.” Wonho follows him obediently. He always does. “Maybe I’ll tell you after, yeah?”

_After what,_ Kihyun thinks, because Wonho’s said that before, and the after he’s referring to never seems to come, but even so, Kihyun can’t stop himself from opening his mouth and asking the same things over and over again, every time. 

“You have to stop turning up at my door with blood down your shirt unless you want me to ask questions,” he points out, curtly, as he turns on the bathroom light and motions for Wonho to sit on the edge of the bathtub.

“But where else would I get first class medical care at two in the morning?” Wonho looks up at him. There is blood on his teeth, a bright red, brighter than Kihyun remembers blood ever being, and he's seen _a lot_ of it. You generally do as a physician in a busy Emergency Room.

“The hospital,” Kihyun replies curtly as he lifts his home-made medical kit down from the top shelf and places it on the floor at his feet.

Wonho laughs, then yelps in pain. Kihyun guesses his lip might need stitches. “Yah, don’t be mad at me,” Wonho says, reaches out to take Kihyun’s hand.

Kihyun pulls his hand away. “I’m not, I’m _worried_ about you.” He has a headache, and he can’t find any antiseptic swabs and there is a trail of blood running down Wonho’s chin and onto his neck from his mouth. “And I'm mad at you,” he adds.

Wonho takes his hand again and this time Kihyun doesn't pull it back.

 

**March Twelfth**

 

Kihyun first meets Wonho when he pulls back the curtains to cubicle five, tired and grouchy at the end of a ten hour stint in Emergency, and gets ready to stitch up the deep cut that sits over its occupants left eyebrow. He can still remember it like it was yesterday, even though it happened more than eight months ago.

Kihyun is running on black coffee and four hours of sleep when he sets to work on his last patient of the shift.

“This looks nasty,” he says, frowning. "It’s going to need stitches.” 

The man sat on the edge of the bed just nods. 

Kihyun sets to work, pulls on gloves and asks, “So, what happened?”

“I’m not drunk or anything.” The man eyes him suspiciously. “If that’s what you’re asking.”

“That’s not what I’m asking. Although I wouldn’t be lying if I said that was unusual for a Saturday night here. _Lots_ of people have been drinking.” He smiles. The patient is handsome, if a little skittish. “Anyway, I don’t need to know what happened, I just need to get you fixed up.”

“Thank you,” the man replies. “Will this be quick? I shouldn’t really be here, I just panicked, was on my own this time…” He stops talking, worries his bottom lip between his teeth.

“Um, I’ll try to be. You have somewhere to go?” Kihyun asks, pulling off his gloves and tossing them into the trash. He smiles at his patient, but his patient is looking somewhere behind him, eyebrows furrowed as he taps the heel of his boot nervously against the leg of the bed, no longer listening.

This isn't exactly unusual either, a lot of people aren't exactly at ease in hospitals and Kihyun doesn’t think much of it as he adds, “Wait here for a moment, please and I’ll be right back to sort that out for you,” and pulls back the curtain.

Kihyun is only gone for a minute, but when he returns to the cubicle, it’s empty.

 

**November Eighth**

 

“You’re really fucking special, you know that?” Wonho lets Kihyun take control, as he tilts his chin up towards him. Wonho is good at being pliant and obedient at times like these; Kihyun guesses he isn’t pliant and obedient at any other time and, hobestly, he likes that it’s him that gets to see Wonho like this.

“Yes, I do, actually.” Kihyun replies, as he holds a wet cloth to Wonho’s mouth and dabs at his lip lightly. “But hearing you say it is nice, I suppose.” He turns back to the sink and rinses the cloth, watches Hoseok’s face in the mirror.

Hoseok meets his eyes and smiles, wincing again as his bottom lip stretches and the cut stings.

When Kihyun turns back to him, he reaches his fingers out towards Hoseok’s face and brushes the soft skin below his lip gently. He frowns, sad, and tired, and in love, and says, “What would you have done if I wasn't here tonight? I have a life, you know. I could have been out.”

“But you weren't out,” Hoseok says.

“No, I wasn’t,” Kihyun replies. Of course he wasn’t. He hardly spends a night away from his apartment unless he's in work, just in case Wonho appears out of the dark, his skin black and blue. Or red, like it is right now; Kihyun’s usually pristine white towels smeared with Wonho's blood. 

Kihyun's in far too deep and he doesn’t even know what he’s deep _into._ He just knows that he’d do anything for the man bleeding onto his bathroom tiles, whoever he is.

 

**March Twelfth**

 

Kihyun always thought he was pretty streetsmart, but he doesn’t even realise that he’s being followed until he’s two blocks away from the hospital and he hears a hesitant, “hey,” from behind him.

When Kihyun turns around there he is--  the patient from the hospital, the one with nice eyes and the bruised eye, the one just who just did a runner and ruined Kihyun’s good mood at the end of his shift. There’s still blood pouring out from the cut above his eye.

“What the fuck?” Kihyun holds out a clenched fist, his apartment keys poking through between his middle and forefinger as a makeshift weapon. He walks home like this a lot, just in case.

“Please don't key me.” The man - Wonho, he soon comes to know him as - holds up his hands. “I'm not going to do anything weird, I promise.”

Kihyun doesn’t make a move forward, but he doesn’t retract his fist either. “Stay there,” Kihyun warns. Asks, “Why are you following me?”

Wonho kind of looks like he wants to be in this situation even less than Kihyun does and Kihyun does  _not_ want to be in this situation one bit. “I’m not following you,” he says. “Well, I guess I technically am. I’m really sorry, but it's still bleeding…”

“I can see that.” Kihyun frowns. “That's why when I said ‘wait’ I didn't mean run the hell away from my professional medical care.”

“I had to get out of there.” Wonho ducks his head and, really, Kihyun should be walking away now, but he’s pissed, because how _dare_ this guy up and run from him? He’s a good doctor. So instead, he asks, “Why, though?”

“It's complicated. I could hear some cops and-”

Kihyun comes to his senses at this. Shakes his head quickly and says, “I'm not doing this.” He turns away. “Goodnight. And if you want some good advice, you really need to get that eye seen to.”

“Please. I can’t go back to the hospital.” There’s such desperation in Wonho's voice that Kihyun almost turns back around. Almost. Instead he just closes his eyes, clenches his fists and continues to walk away.

“ _Please_.”

Kihyun stops, sighs loudly and hisses,  “I can’t believe this. I-- just-- come with me, then.”

Kihyun sneaks tiny glances to the side as they walk, panic rising as the blood continues to run from the cut above his patient’s eye. Kihyun has no idea what he’s doing by taking this guy home, aside from probably making a big mistake. Maybe this is the worst decision he’s ever made in his life, but for some reason he wants to go through with it. He wants to help, wants to finish what he started back at the hospital, and maybe it’s something to do with the mixed up feelings of attraction and anger he has towards the man trailing next to him who is looking equally vulnerable and completely on edge.

When they get to his place, Kihyun leads the way up the steps and motions for Wonho to stop. “Wait there. And actually do it this time,” he says.

Wonho does wait this time; Stands on Kihyun’s front step, blood running down the side of his face, until Kihyun returns with his tiny, home-made first-aid kit and a bottle of vodka and begins to usher him inside the hallway.

“No, actually, wait. Before I let you in,” Kihyun frowns. “I don’t even know your name.” He waits for a response, but a response doesn't come. “My name isKihyun, now it’s your turn.”

His patient looks down, stares at the ground until Kihyun coughs and says, “You’re going to drip blood onto my step and I really don't want that to happen.”

“Sorry.” His patient looks up again, gives Kihyun a half-smile and says, “You can call me Wonho, if you want to.”

“If I want to?” Kihyun narrows his eyes. Is this guy fucking with him? “Is it your name or not?”

Wonho thinks about this. Blood drips onto the step. “Not. But… Just think of it like a stage name,” he says finally. “Can I come in yet?”

Kihyun reluctantly opens the door wide enough for Wonho to step inside. He can’t believe he’s doing this and he’s suddenly unsure of how he’s actually going to help.

Kihyun is a careful person, tidy and meticulous, and the last time he did so much as get a papercut was almost a year ago, so his home isn’t very well equipped for stitching up wounded mystery men. He has some steri-strips though that might do half as good a job as he was going to do back at the hospital. It’ll be better than leaving the wound open, at least, if not much. Kihyun finds steri-strips and clean towels, but can't find any antiseptic alcohol swabs. He locates half a bottle of vodka im the back of a cupboard and realises he'll have to make do. He feels like he's in the middle of a disaster movie.

Wonho hovers in the hallway and eyes the bottle of vodka. “Is that to clean the wound?” He asks.

“No, it’s to make Cosmopolitans afterwards.” Kihyun rolls his eyes as he beckons Wonho into his bathroom. " _Yes_ , of course it’s to clean the wound.”

Wonho smiles at the snark, as if he somehow finds it endearing, and Kihyun’s heart flutters a little at this, but he ignores the desire to smile back, takes a deep breath and pretends he’s back at the hospital, on-duty.

 

**November Eighth**

 

Kihyun doesn’t bother pretending anymore.

Playing the professional physician when Wonho is under his hands is pointless because this is anything but professional and Kihyun has started to wonder if he’s actually faking it when he puts on his scrubs and clocks in for his shifts at the hospital. Wonders if maybe his real job is just a way to pass the time in between Wonho’s visits now.

Kihyun tries to zone into the task and steady his fingers as he sets to clean Wonho’s mouth. Says, “Why is it so hard to say no to you?”

“I just have one of those faces,” Wonho replies between Kihyun’s gentle dabs at his bottom lip.

“Bruised and bloody?” Kihyun raises an eyebrow.

“Charming and persuasive. And loveable.”

Kihyun scoffs, but he doesn’t argue. "Why do you insist on wearing white shirts when you’re always bleeding?” He wants to get Wonho’s clothes in the washer, hates seeing him messed up like this. “Lift your arms up,” he says.

Wonho laughs and says, “I can take my own clothes off, thank you very much.”

“With busted knuckles?” Kihyun works at undoing Wonho’s buttons. His chest is warm beneath Kihyun's hands, and Kihyun kind of wishes he were taking Wonho’s shirt off in a different dimension, one in which this is a romantic moment in the normal way - after dinner, after wine and candles and music - and not in the fucked up way it happens in this dimension.

“They’re just-” Wonho flexes his fingers and closes his eyes tightly. Kihyun can tell he’s in pain. “-A little bruised.”

“Your definition of a little is very far from the truth,” Kihyun says softly, and pushes the shirt down over Wonho’s shoulders. “And so is your definition of loveable.”

Wonho flexes his fingers again and pouts. “You’re always so mean to me.”

“You always deserve it.” Kihyun replies, and it comes out more sad than snarky, but whatever, it’s true. Men who turn up on your doorstep randomly with wounds instead of flowers, who tell you they love you but won’t tell you their name, they _do_ deserve it.

“I know,” Wonho replies, his eyes searching Kihyun’s desperately, but Kihyun turns away to the sink before Wonho's eyes can find what they're searching for, washes his hands and bites the inside of his cheek to dull the ache in his chest.

 

**March Seventeenth**

 

Kihyun lies in bed on the nights following their first meeting and thinks about how ridiculous it is that he went all back-street medical and tried to stitch up a man he didn’t know with a mock-up medical kit in his bathroom.

He knows that he shouldn’t have allowed a stranger - an _attractive_ stranger, but a stranger all the same, (and, really, attractive ones are usually the most dangerous type) - back to his apartment after he had bolted from the hospital because of the presence of cops, but the stranger, in his defence, had been quite a gentleman, really. Had held still when Kihyun asked him to. Had thanked him countless times, sincerity in his brown eyes clear even with the pink and purple bruise blooming around one of them. He’d been a damned lot more gracious than most of Kihyun’s Friday night patients, thats for sure.

It’s almost a week later, a little after midnight, and Kihyun is still feeling the disorientating effects of coming off a run of all-night shifts the day before. He’s napped most of the afternoon, and now he should be going to bed he’s not even remotely tired. He loves his job, but right in this moment he hates his job too. Tiredness can do that.

His buzzer goes and when Kihyun opens the door, Wonho is there, blowing smoke into the air and staring up at the night sky.

Wonho stubs out the cigarette he’s been smoking with the toe of his boot and smiles at Kihyun. The bruise around his eye has faded and he looks almost shy standing there in the doorway. It doesn’t suit him, Kihyun decides.

“I wasn’t sure if you would be here,” Wonho says.

Kihyun wraps his arms around himself, wishes he was wearing more than just a thin t-shirt. “I’m here.”

Wonho nods. “Good. I just-- I wanted to apologise for the other night. Again.”

“Apology accepted.” Kihyun can tell that isn’t really why Wonho’s here, but he can’t figure out why he _would_ be here. He wasn’t expecting to see him again and he suddenly feels self-conscious.

Wonho hovers on the doorstep; there’s a bloodstain next to his shoe that he left behind the week before. He doesn’t seem to notice it, though. “Also, you haven’t-- you’ve not _told_ anyone about me, have you?”

Oh, So _that’s_ why he’s here. Kihyun bristles. He's annoyed at the question; It’s a stupid fucking question.

“Have I told anyone that a patient followed me home after doing a disappearing act? And then I let him into my apartment and did some hack job on his bust-up eyebrow even when he was super dodgy and gave me a fake name?” Kihyun pulls a face. “No, surprisingly, I haven’t.”

“I’m-- I am really sorry about that.” Wonho pulls his bottom lip between his teeth. He does look genuinely sorry, if Kihyun is being honest, and seeing this tugs at something in his chest.

Kihyun sighs. “It’s fine… Whatever. The cut actually looks like it healed really well, considering."

“I have to go now.” Wonho says and fiddles with the cuff of his leather jacket. There’s a gold pin on the sleeve and Kihyun wonders if it means anything. Wonders a lot of things about the stranger with a fake name who seems to be making a habit of appearing out of nowhere. “Stay safe, okay?”

Kihyun almost laughs. “Shouldn’t I be saying that to you?” He asks as Wonho walks away, into the night.

“Maybe,” Wonho replies, looking back. “It was really nice to see you again. Bye.”

And then he’s gone.

The next morning Kihyun thinks he might have dreamt the second visit, but the cigarette butt he spots outside his front step on his way out to work says otherwise.

 

**November Eighth**

 

Wonho doesn’t smell of cigarettes tonight, so Kihyun decides that maybe he won’t make him brush his teeth before they fall into bed later. Because they’ll do that, go to bed, they always do, now.

Wonho holds out his hand and watches intently as Kihyun rubs ointment into his knuckles with determined fingers. “You enjoy this, don’t you?” Wonho tilts his head, smiles as best he can with steri-strips across his bottom lip.

“What? Enjoy getting no sleep? Or being your personal physician?”

“You enjoy getting to boss me around.”

“I’m not bossing you around, I’m trying to--” Kihyun grits his teeth, refuses to look Wonho in the eye when he’s right, because, yeah, Kihyun _does_ like it. He can’t control much about their relationship, but he _can_ have the upper hand when he’s dressing a wound. “I’m just trying to make sure you don’t die.”

“Ah, I see.” Wonho gives him a wink. “Whatever you say, doctor.”

Kihyun works in silence. A car alarm starts to go off somewhere outside and makes them both jump. “What if I said you should leave?” Kihyun asks after a while.

“What?”

“You said ‘whatever you say’, but what if I said I didn’t want you here? What if I told you to go?” He continues working, mouth drawn tight. He isn’t sure what he wants Wonho to reply to this.

Wonho says, “I would. If it’s what you wanted. Say it and I would.”

And for the smallest of moments, Kihyun is tempted to, just to know that he could. But he doesn’t, so maybe he wouldn’t be able to say it after all. Instead he says, “I’m all done with your lip. You should probably shower now, there’s blood in your hair,” and tosses Wonho a fresh towel.

Kihyun knows the blood in Wonho’s hair probably isn’t his own. Probably belongs to another Wonho, working for another-- what? Organisation, maybe. Or gang. Syndicate? There are a lot of words to describe the sort of people Wonho associates with but Wonho has never told him which one to use. He’s told him practically nothing at all.

Kihyun wonders if the other Wonho, the one whose blood is stuck to strands of Wonho’s hair, has another Kihyun. He wonders if the other Kihyun would be strong enough to tell their Wonho to leave. Unlike him. 

And then he laughs at the absurdity of his life, changes into a fresh t-shirt and gets into bed to wait for Wonho to come back from the shower, clean, and soft, and his.

 

**April Twenty-Second**

 

The situation has been absurd all along.

Absurd since they first met. Absurd since the thank you, and absurd since the second time Wonho drips blood onto Kihyun’s doorstep, although, thankfully, this time it washes away in heavy rain before the morning.

Kihyun has never been so grateful for bad weather.

“Shit, what-- What the hell?” He peers out into the night as his buzzer goes well after three AM. He’s in flannel pyjamas, half dazed, and there is Wonho - hair flat against his forehead, water running off his nose and chin, and blood mixed with rainwater that’s soaking his shirt.

“It’s-- it’s nothing.” Wonho grimaces, steps closer. Kihyun can see that there is a wound in his side and it’s bleeding heavily. This isn’t just a bust eyebrow, this is something more serious.

“I just-- I think it seems quite bad and-- I’m so sorry for coming here again, but I know you’re cool.”

“Fuck. You _think_ it’s bad? It’s fucking obviously bad.” Kihyun hisses and ushers him inside the hallway quickly, checking the street is empty before he shuts the door.

He vows to stock up on better supplies for his first-aid kit as he sits Wonho down. He wonders if he can persuade the friendly guy in the pharmacy to look the other way the next time he can get him alone in the pharmacy. He needs more of -- well, more of _everything,_ especially if Wonho’s visits are going to become more frequent.

Luckily, it turns out all of that blood that coats Kihyun’s new towel set isn’t Wonho’s. Kihyun isn’t sure what to make of this knowledge, but for now he takes it as good thing, because Wonho doesn’t bleed out on his couch that night and instead Kihyun manages to stop the bleeding entirely quite quickly. He dresses the wound, which is more of a scrape really, and asks, “I take it the aim was for the knife to go _in,_ not just to graze along your skin?”

Wonho nods. “Luckily I have good reflexes.”

“Obviously.” Kihyun wrings his hands. He's glad he isn't dealing with a stab wound right now. It makes him think about what Wonho does for a living, and about the things about this he has been wondering about since they met.

 “What would happen to me if I knew your real name?” he asks and watches Wonho’s face.

“I don’t know. Maybe nothing,” Wonho replies. His words are careful, his expression measured. “It’s just-- the people I work for, they're… Well, it’s best not to know much about any of it. It’s best if you know nothing at all.”

Kihyun considers this. “I see.”

“You know it doesn’t mean that-- that I don’t like you, don’t you?”

“Thanks, I’m honoured.”

“Seriously.” Wonho smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. His eyes are sad, a pensive ocean that Kihyun thinks he might be willing to drown in. “I think you’d be good for me. If you weren’t _too_ good for me, if you know what I mean.”

Kihyun runs his hands over his face and makes an exasperated noise. “ _No_ , Wonho, I don’t know what you mean because you talk in riddles and you won’t tell me anything about you. Someone tried to stab you tonight and instead of visiting the hospital you turned up on my doorstep on the off-chance I’d be here to stop you from bleeding to death.”

Wonho’s smile falters if only for a fraction of a second. “I know, I’m sorry.”

“You’re very apologetic for someone who seems to be well-versed in violence,” Kihyun says.

“I’m well-versed in a lot of things,” Wonho replies. Looks up, those brown eyes hypnotising Kihyun. He wants to look away, but he also wants to soak up the view forever. His head hurts. “I meant it, though. I like you.”

And Kihyun doesn’t want to care about whether Wonho likes him or hates him or has any opinion about him at all, but, if he is honest, he does. He _really_ fucking does. 

When Wonho kisses him, Kihyun kisses him back harder. Kisses out all of his confusion and anger and annoyance, lets Wonho pull him flush against his body and lick into his mouth with a moan, and then pulls away and says, “You can get out of my house now.”

He feels satisfied for a while, and then lonely for a lot longer.

 

**November Eighth**

 

Kihyun fakes the power now and pretends that he could end all of this with a few words, but he knows he probably wouldn't be able to bring himself to refuse Wonho, even if he wanted to.

He still feels lonely, sometimes, but it's easy to forget about that then Wonho is there with him, towel wrapped around his waist, wet hair slicked back after his shower.

“Do you think it needs bandaging?” He holds up his right fist, four bruised knuckles in a row.

"Maybe you should stop punching people for a while. Bruised knuckles are a bitch, but a broken hand is a whole other thing and you're not far off."

"Sorry Dr Yoo." Wonho climbs onto the bed, kneels behind Kihyun and wraps his arms around his shoulders.

Kihyun tries and fails not to allow the intense relief always brought on by Wonho’s touch to wash over him. "You can borrow some sweatpants to put on if you want,” he says as Wonho pulls him close against him.

"I'm good," Wonho replies and shifts back away from Kihyun, sitting back against the pillows.

Kihyun mourns the loss of his touch and wishes he didn’t. Wonho nudges him in the small of his back with one of his feet. "But you can take yours off if you want, instead."

Kihyun makes a noise, a low sound of annoyance. "You're not funny,” he says, but there’s no meanness to the words. “Move over,” he adds, and moves up the bed until they’re sitting side by side. Wonho’s towel slips open when he shifts for Kihyun to sit next to him, but he makes no move to cover his thigh back up. Just says, "I missed you," and traces an invisible pattern on Kihyun’s covered knee with his fingertip.

Kihyun swallows the lump in his throat brought on by anger, tiredness, worry and (most of all) love. Replies, "I missed you too. I wish that I didn't."

Wonho stops tracing patterns and shakes his head, his slicked back hair coming apart and flopping over his forehead. "I know that it's hard and... Fuck, I wish-- I really wish things were different. You’re so good to me, Kihyun-ah." He frowns, his forehead creasing into tiny lines of frustration. "Thank you for tonight."

And Kihyun reaches out then, pushes Wonho's hair back off his face. The skin around his mouth is pink and swollen, but he's still handsome. He always is. “You’ll make it up to me somehow, I’m sure,” he says.

“But I won’t." Wonho shakes his head again. He looks at Kihyun, right at him, and gives him that smile that is charming and sexy and loveable, but doesn't reach his eyes. "I won’t make it up to you, and we both know it.”

“Shush.” Kihyun closes his eyes, brings his hand down to settle just below the soft hairs along the nape of Wonho's his neck and says, "Just kiss me."

They've done this countless times since Kihyun first vented his confusion with hungry kisses, but countless times isn't even enough, because Kihyun wants always and he wants forever. He wants routine and he wants reliability and he wants _this_ every single night.

He's never going to get that, though. That much is clear. So, he'll take what he can get of Wonho: the fleeting visits, the intense confessions of love, even the blood and the broken bones. It;s enough, if only because it has to be.

 

**May Tenth**

 

Kihyun spends the weeks after their first kiss glimpsing visions of Wonho on every gurney that is rushed passed him in the hospital corridors. He walks through wards and his heart pounds and his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth, and he wonders where Wonho is, what trouble he’s getting into. Whether he is well, or injured. Whether he’s even alive.

He is alive.

He’s standing across the road from Kihyun’s front door, leaning against a wall in the shadows, when Kihyun gets home from a trip to the grocery store after work. He slips into step with Kihyun as though he’s been with him all along, holds out a hand and takes one of Kihyun’s grocery bags from him.

“Can I come in for a while?” He asks, as they approach Kihyun’s front door.

Kihyun rests the grocery bag on his hip and takes out his keys. Remembers holding them as a makeshift weapon that night they met. It seems so ridiculous now. “Why? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just need to put my head down.”

“You mean that you need somewhere to lay low for a night?”

Wonho pauses. “I didn’t say that,” he says. He looks a little flustered. Kihyun can make out the remnants of a bruise around his right eye.

“You didn’t have to,” Kihyun replies, but he lets Wonho in, anyway.

They make smalltalk. Or, more accurately, Wonho asks Kihyun questions which Kihyun answers, and Kihyun asks Wonho questions which he ignores.

“I can never stop thinking about you, you know,” Wonho says with a smile, as if it’s a funny thing to say.

“You could try,” Kihyun replies.

Wonho shrugs. Says, “Maybe, but I don’t want to.”

The next morning, before he slips out of Kihyun’s bed and back out into the world he’s been hidden from for nine hours, Wonho takes Kihyun’s hand and moves it up to his face, pressing Kihyun’s fingers to the scar just above his eyebrow. “Remember this?” He asks.

“It was less than two months ago,” Kihyun says, smiles despite himself. “It happened the night we met, of course I remember.”

Wonho smiles, brings Kihyun’s fingers down to his mouth and kisses them, one by one. “The hands that fix me up,” he says in between kisses. “Are very, very special.”

Kihyun rolls his eyes. He’s bushing and he knows it shows. “Is that all I’m good for?” He asks, meets Wonho’s gaze, which is warm and fond and open. For once, his smile reaches his eyes.

“You’re _all_ good,” Wonho clarifies and presses a final kiss to the palm of Kihyun’s hand. “I have to go soon, but-- it’s okay if I come back again, right?”

“It’s always okay.” Kihyun admits.  “Are you going to tell me more about you next time I see you?”

Wonho mulls over this question. Wraps an arm around Kihyun’s bare waist as if it belongs there and says, “Maybe.”

(He’s back on Kihyun’s doorstep four days later with a sprained wrist and more apologies, but no answers. Not that Kihyun was really expecting any.)

 

**November Eighth**

 

Kissing Wonho is exhilarating.

It always has been; Kihyun is hungry for Wonho’s attention and Wonho is hungry for Kihyun’s approval and their kisses are always a blur of too many emotions and too little time together.

Kihyun pulls away from the kiss, a metallic taste on his own tongue. He tilts his head back as far into the pillow as it will go and looks up at Wonho’s mouth, tries to move back far enough to really see it in focus. “Be careful, I think it’s going to bleed again, maybe we should stop.”

Wonho shakes his head. “It’s fine.” He leans down, kisses Kihyun tenderly, their lips barely touching. “See? This is nice, right?”

Kihyun is hesitant, but, his mouth opens up under Wonho’s gentle persistence. “Yeah,” he breathes, eyes closed, hands on Wonho’s back. His skin is warm and Kihyun’s fingers linger at the scar on his side - the one he got from the knife wound back in April.

Wonho nudges Kihyun’s nose softly with his own until Kihyun opens his eyes, smiles when he does. “I wish we could do this every night,” Wonho whispers, sits up on his knees and runs his hands underneath Kihyun's body, eases Kihyun’s hips up off the bed.

Kihyun writhes as he slips his sweatpants and briefs down over his thighs, Wonho pulling them down the rest of the way, stopping to stroke the soft skin under Kihyun’s ankle as he goes.

“We could,” Kihyun says. “Couldn’t we?” It’s not a rhetorical question, but Wonho takes it that way, like he does with most questions and doesn't answer it.

“Fuck, you look amazing.” Wonho runs his hand back up Kihyun’s leg, the rough pads of his fingers skimming his knees and moving up and round to stroke his inner thighs. “ _You’re_ amazing.”

“Keep touching,” Kihyun says, wets his lips as Wonho runs his fingers over the most sensitive skin at the top of his thigh, his skin fluttering under Wonho’s measured touch. Kihyun struggles to keep still, relishes in the feeling. Begs, “Don’t stop.” Wonho’s fingers brush against Kihyun’s cock and Kihyun trembles at the contact.

“If I could tell people about you, I’d tell them how beautiful you are,” Wonho says, voice far away. Sad, even. His touch becomes less and less fleeting and more firm, stroking the underside of Kihyun’s cock until he’s squirming, hard in Wonho’s hand.

Even with his eyes closed, he can sense Wonho is leaning in close to his face, and when Wonho cups his chin with his free hand (the swollen one, Kihyun remembers, lifting his own hand up to hold it gently over Wonho’s bruised fingers) Kihyun lifts his head eagerly to meet Wonho’s mouth. Kihyun parts his lips to deepen the kiss and whimpers as Wonho thumbs over the head of Kihyun’s cock as he does.

“I don’t even deserve you,” Wonho says against his mouth as they part for air.

Kihyun whispers, “No,” and he isn’t sure whether he’s disagreeing with Wonho or simply confirming the statement. It doesn’t matter, anyway, Kihyun thinks, because Wonho has him, now and always, whether he deserves to or not.

 

**June Twentieth**

 

 

“Am I just-- I don't know... Convenient?” Kihyun asks Wonho one warm night as Spring trickles slowly into Summer.

Kihyun isn’t stupid; he’s been thinking realistically about Wonho’s visits. Actually, he's _always_ thinking about them. He thinks about the fact that if Wonho never came back o see him again he could do nothing about it but wait to see his photo in a story about gang violence on the news. It's not exactly what Kihyun imagines when he thinks of the typical relationship. 

They don’t text each other cute messages to say goodnight when they’re apart, because they don’t know each other’s phone numbers. They don't take cute couple selfies together, or hold hands as they walk down the street. They don’t complain about each other to their respective friends, because they’ve told no one the other even exists.

They don’t even know each other, not really. At least, Kihyun isn’t sure he really knows anything about Wonho aside from the curve of his jaw and the pressure of his kisses. And it scares him, how intense his feelings have become over the last three months for a man whose name he doesn’t know.

It also scares him to think about how easily he can hide these feelings; how well he feigns genuine interest in being set up on a blind date by the friendly pharmacy assistant he sometimes shares a coffee break with and how naturally he complains about non-existent noisy neighbours when explaining why he can’t stop yawning the morning after he’s been kept awake at three AM, wrapping a hospital regulation bandage that he’d slipped into his pocket the week before around Wonho’s bleeding head.

Wonho slips his hand into Kihyun’s, squeezes it tightly. “I don’t know what you mean, baby.”

“I _mean,_  that’s the only reason you’re here isn’t it? Budget private healthcare and a place to sleep when you’re in trouble with the bad people you associate with. I’m convenient to you, that’s all.” Kihyun watches for giveaways in Wonho’s expression that show he’s right.

He only gets furrowed brows. Wonho blinks, gaze serious. “Do you really think that about me?” He sounds hurt and Kihyun almost wants to cry at the frustration he feels.

“I don’t know.” Kihyun sighs.

“You’re not _convenient_.” Wonho says. “You’re perfect.”

Kihyun smiles a little, laughs quietly. “Perfectly stupid.”

Wonho’s voice cracks a little, desperate as he says, ““No. No-- I think about you _all_ of the time. I’d come here more if I could-- God, I wish we could be like other couples. I’d be _proud_ to be able to say I’m with you.”

“Do it then.” Kihyun pushes. “Say it. Tell people.”

Wonho pauses. Says, finally, “You don’t want that, really. You wouldn’t be safe, then.”

“Oh, so you’re just being chivalrous? Making sure I can’t be used as-- what? A bargaining tool in some movie-style mafia showdown?” Kihyun scoffs. It sounds silly when he says it, but he knows it’s serious, really.

Wonho says, “Is it so bad that I don’t ever want you to get hurt?” And Kihyun feels guilty for ever doubting his intentions.

“No.” Kihyun says, rests his forehead on Wonho’s shoulder and bites back tears. “No, it’s not.”

They hold hands all night as they sleep and, even though Kihyun has cramp in his fingers the next morning, it feels worth it.

 

**November Eighth**

 

There’s a sense of finality to every time they fuck that makes Kihyun wonder if it’s going to be the last time they'll see each other. Even the first time, it felt like the last, as though the day they met wasn’t the day their relationship started, but the day it began to end.

Kihyun crosses his ankles behind the small of Wonho’s back, digs his heels into his skin as Wonho rocks his hips forward. Kihyun focuses on the vein in Wonho’s neck, the angle of his jaw as he fucks into him. Despite how soft Kihyun has tried to be with it, Wonho’s bottom lip is swollen and red around the cut and even though Kihyun hates seeing him in pain, they would never have met if it wasn’t for Wonho being hurt, so it’s difficult for Kihyun to truly hate seeing him this way.

He has a complicated relationship with his boyfriend’s injuries, maybe one more complicated than he has with his boyfriend, if anything could be more complicated than that is.

He digs his heels in even harder, watches as Wonho’s red mouth twists into a tiny grimace. “Baby,” he says and Kihyun relaxes his ankles and bucks his hips to meet Wonho’s stuttered movements. The grimace dissipates, replaced with that easy smile Kihyun remembers from the first night they met.

The smile reaches his eyes and it makes Kihyun almost want to tell Wonho that he loves him when he comes.

(But he doesn’t.)

 

**August Sixteenth**

 

There’s a night in Summer when Kihyun is awoken a little before two in the morning by his buzzer and, even before he reaches the door, he can tell as if by instinct that something is very, very wrong.

Kihyun's scared and his blood is running cold and he's panicking, because when he opens the door, Wonho is half propped up in the doorway, teeth gritted, eyes watering from pain. He holds his arm tight against his own stomach, and there's blood there, so much blood, fanning out around the space underneath it.

He’s wearing a white fucking shirt again and Kihyun focuses on how stupid this is to distract himself from completely breaking down.

"Don't freak out." Wonho gasps for breath, and Kihyun almost wants to laugh, because it's far too late for that. "But it's-- in my arm, there's a bullet --"

“I’m calling the police." Kihyun cuts him off, half dragging him inside his hallway. The door slams and for once he doesn’t even care.

It's times like these that Kihyun is thankful that his only neighbour is over eighty and about as deaf as can be. His friends had laughed when they'd heard which neighbourhood he'd moved into at first, calling him grandma and telling him to wave goodbye to his social life. He'd pointed out that he'd waved goodbye to that the minute he'd entered medical school, and, anyway, the neighbourhood was within walking distance from the hospital.

It had been useful to live in a quiet neighbourhood then, and it's useful now, just for different reasons.

“No. No, please.” Wonho grips at Kihyun's hand. "You promised you'd never do that, you said--"

“You’ve been shot, Wonho. With a _gun_.” Kihyun opens the bathroom closet and pulls out every towel - hand, bath, beach - he can find.

“I know, that’s how it usually happens," Wonho replies through clenched teeth. “I’ve never felt pain like it.”

“I have to call an ambulance at least, I can't do this myself, I-- this isn't the _hospital_ , Wonho," Kihyun pleads. “This is too much. I'm _so_ fucking worried about you."

“No, no, _please_ . It-- I'm not allowed, and they’ll call the cops and-- no.” Wonho’s voice cracks, desperation bleeding through. “I just want you. I only trust _you_."

And Kihyun could cry. He might do, he thinks, afterwards. Whatever the outcome. “Fuck. I’m not-- I don’t remove bullets on a daily basis,” he says. “I’m not a surgeon. Not even… What if I can’t do it?”

“You _can_ . You can do it, I know it.” Wonho, damn him, actually _smiles_ through gritted teeth and watering eyes. “Maybe there’s a tutorial online about it.”

And there _is_ , there actually is. Kihyun doesn’t know what the world is coming to, but he’s thankful for all of it’s fucked up glory.

His bathroom looks like a set from a slasher movie, afterwards. It takes four straight hours to clean all of the blood stains, and Kihyun vows he’s going to be nicer to the hospital cleaners after this. They must work so hard to keep the place spotless if he’s on his knees hours after Wonho has disappeared off to god knows where with a bandaged up bullet wound in his arm.

A _bullet_ wound.

In the hospital, a bullet wound means informing the police right away. It means a fuckton of paperwork and something to gossip about during the next coffee break.

Apparently it doesn’t mean much out of the ordinary in Wonho’s line of work.

Kihyun closes his eyes, remembers Wonho’s jaw clenched with pain as he’d bitten down on a hastily folded up towel to stop himself from screaming whilst Kihyun had cleaned out the wound. Remembers his heart beating in his ears, so scared, so worried about Wonho that it hurt him to even breathe.

Remembers Wonho’s arms around him afterwards, his whispered words: the _thank you_ and the _fuck, that was close_ , and the _I love you_ that was barely even a whisper.

The words that somehow make all of the pain worth it, the ones that Kihyun won't say back.

 

**November Eighth**

 

Kihyun drifts between post-fucking bliss and sleep, until Wonho pulls him in tightly, leaving butterfly kisses along his jawline and the urge to sleep leaves him for a while. He can sleep tomorrow when Wonho inevitably isn’t here anymore.

Wonho flexes his bruised knuckles and says, “Does my lip look kind of good swollen? I bet it does.”

Kihyun scowls. “It looks like a bust-up lip.”

Wonho laughs softly and Kihyun settles against his chest, closes his eyes and listens for the soft thump of Wonho’s heartbeat beneath his ear, but he can’t hear it today. “Will you _ever_ tell me about your life?” He asks. One last time.

Wonho kisses his hair and Kihyun hears, crystal clear, the ‘no’ that Wonho doesn't say out loud. He doesn't need to say it, because Kihyun can see, deep down, that Wonho thinks he's doing the right thing, the noble thing, by keeping Kihyun in the dark. And, maybe he is, but kihyun doesn't _want_ noble, he wants _to know._

“I love you,” Wonho says instead. And Kihyun almost says it back, because he does love Wonho, he loves him more than he thinks might be reasonable. But he doesn’t say it, he never says it, because he’s scared that if he does the balance between them will tip too far over.

Maybe when Wonho gives him his name, his _real_ name, Kihyun will give him the truth and tell him how much he loves him. But Wonho won’t give him his real name, so Kihyun will never say the words.

In the morning, Wonho is gone and, as always, he comes back a week later, dripping blood onto Kihyun’s front step as he arrives and holding his hand tightly in the night after the blood is gone. It's not everything that Kihyun wants, and maybe it isn’t everything that Wonho wants either, really, but it's everything they have, so it's enough.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Feedback always appreciated. <333


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